<--PREV Doc #628  |  Memorial Commission Home Page  |  First Term Table of Contents  |  Presidential Papers Home Page  |  Doc#  |  NEXT--> Doc #630 Document #629; December 22, 1953 To Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr. Series: EM, AWF, Administration Series ; Category: Memorandum. Secret The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, Volume XV - The Presidency: The Middle Way Part IV: "Pushing ahead along the broad center"; December 1953 to March 1954 Chapter 8: A world "racing toward catastrophe"   Attached hereto is a memorandum which I request that you give serious study.1 I have had only the briefest of opportunities to go into the various matters suggested in it, but I am sufficiently aware of the whole situation to realize that constructive work must be done--and done soon. If it should be decided by you and other individuals in the Administration who are experienced in these matters that this memorandum presents an accurate picture of our difficulties and a reasonable approach to the job of removing them, then we might have it rewritten so as to be a document of the so-called "Strategy Committee" and take it up specifically and in detail with the Chairman of the National Committee.2 In any event, I am most hopeful that you will give such matters as this your personal and continuing attention. Needless to say, the memorandum in its present form should be held very closely and regarded as strictly secret. 1 Following his work as national chairman of the Eisenhower-for-President campaign, Lodge--now U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations--had continued to serve as a part-time adviser to the President on Republican Party politics. In November Eisenhower had appointed Lodge Special Adviser to the President on U.N. affairs and domestic politics (see Lodge, As It Was, pp. 123-24). The memorandum to which Eisenhower referred had been written by Charles F. Willis, Jr., assistant to Sherman Adams; it was titled "Objective Analysis of the Republican Party" (Jan. 18, 1954, Lodge Papers). Willis pointed out that there was a need (1) to weed out the "deadwood" in the Republican National Committee; (2) to establish a "Strategy Board" comprised of experienced "full-time" politicians; (3) to study the problems and functions of the National Committee and (4) to improve cooperation between officials of the Executive Branch and the Committee regarding patronage. 2 In his reply to the President of December 30 (AWF/A) Lodge addressed Willis's principal points as follows: On weeding out "deadwood," Lodge cautioned that such a measure should be handled "skillfully and carefully in each State on a selective basis using initially the Citizens' Committee and effective individuals." On establishing a "Strategy Board," Lodge said he doubted the wisdom of such a plan. Among the dangers, he pointed out, were that its composition would eventually become known and would offend those not included; such a group, he said, could become an unfortunate "source of leaks to the press." "Better than a board" would be a politically experienced individual who could "keep in touch with politically knowledgeable people throughout the country" to develop "shrewd judgments, opinions and ideas" for the President. On the problems of the National Committee, Lodge wrote that he agreed with Willis that "Len Hall is the best man available for the job." Lodge said that he planned to discuss staff structure and meetings format with Hall in January 1954. Affirming that there was poor cooperation between the executive branch and the Committee regarding patronage, he recommended that such matters be "controlled" at the White House level--the "focal point," he said, "from which all appointments come." Bibliographic reference to this document: Eisenhower, Dwight D. Memorandum. Secret To Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr., 22 December 1953. In The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, ed. L. Galambos and D. van Ee, doc. 629. World Wide Web facsimile by The Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial Commission of the print edition; Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996, http://www.eisenhowermemorial.org/presidential-papers/first-term/documents/629.cfm <--PREV Doc #628  |  Memorial Commission Home Page  |  First Term Table of Contents  |  Presidential Papers Home Page  |  Doc#  |  NEXT--> Doc #630

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